California Attorney General Rob Bonta last night filed a request for a preliminary injunction in California’s existing case against Amazon for price fixing. Attorney General Bonta’s 2022 lawsuit alleged that the company stifled competition and caused increased prices across California through its anticompetitive policies in order to avoid competing on price with other retailers. New evidence paints a clearer and more shocking picture. The motion for a preliminary injunction comes after a robust discovery process where California uncovered evidence of countless interactions in which Amazon, vendors, and Amazon’s competitors agree to increase and fix the prices of products on other retail websites to bolster Amazon’s profits. Time and again, across years and product categories, Amazon has reached out to its vendors and instructed them to increase retail prices on competitors’ websites, threatening dire consequences if vendors do not comply. Vendors, bullied by Amazon’s overwhelming bargaining leverage and fearing punishment, comply — agreeing to raise prices on competitors’ websites (often with the awareness and cooperation of the competing retailer), or to remove products from competing websites altogether. Amazon’s goal is to insulate itself from price competition by preventing lower retail prices in the market at the expense of American consumers who are already struggling with a crisis of affordability.
Easy solution: don’t use Amazon.
You lived without it before. You can do it again.
What is this a solution to? You’re going to pay high prices even if you don’t buy from Amazon, due to Amazon’s illegal price fixing. That’s what the OP is about.
Things are at a point where the only solution is in the courts.
They drove a large swath of stores out of business. It’s vastly more difficult
Yeah it was a trap.
The best you can do now is order a lot of stuff directly from China.
Time to replace Amazon dropshipping with AliExpress.
Probably same vendor at the end.
The only iasue I see is local customer service and return of an order.
That is way easier with Amazon (at the cost of the seller).
AliExpress’ purchase protection is a total farce.
In one case, I was shipped the wrong variant of an item and the seller was totally unresponsive. Submitted evidence, AliExpress closed the case saying that Tracking shows it was delivered. No way to appeal.
In another case, I ordered something to my business and the Chinese courier service left the parcel out front on a public sidewalk. Naturally, the parcel was stolen. The courier service eventually admitted, in writing, that the delivery was mishandled and that the shipper was the only one who could file a claim. Once again, vendor unresponsive, AliExpress closes the case saying @Tracking shows delivered” with no way to appeal.
Meanwhile, I had a $1,000 Amazon package get stolen the other week and they refunded it with minimal fuss. The return policy is so easy might as well be “try before you buy”. I can see why people have a hard time de-Amazoning.
Amazon sure did refund it.
And then proceeded to charge the seller the amount + handling fees.
Anyway: As I said, AE customer handling is…difficult.
I already look there first :)
Def the same vendor at the end (well most of the time on the kind of stuff I buy)
The amount I save on 3-4 things is usually enough to negate an Amazon purchase.
That said, I’m not the kind of person who makes big or risky purchases from either of these places.
One time I shopped for an ESP32 with an USB-C slim cable (3m) and a weather safe enclosure.
Amazon: >40€
AliExpress: <30€ (incl. shipping but waiting thrice as long).
Oh well, didnt need it fast anyway ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
And to add to that, try searching for a product on a search engine.
Almost always the first links are Amazon.
And a lot of times there are no other options.
That’s like saying the simple solution to global warming is for people to not burn fossil fuels. It ignores the conditions that led to this becoming a problem in the first place; and it ignores the power of entrenched industry to protect their own interest.
What we need is political reform. so that the bodies that are supposed regulate industry and serve the public are empowered to make the necessary reforms. Lina Kahn was doing just that (before Trump got elected again in 2024)
I’m not trying to diminish the importance and role of personal accountability and individual action, but as a solution to affect meaningful change it falls well short.
Expect for you know the fact Amazon ran 40% of businesses out of business and covid killed another 40%.
Your option in the vast majority of the case is to get fucked or use Amazon/AliExpress which is just Amazon China edition.
Which is infinitely worse then Amazon. At least Amazon has basic consumer protections unlike AliExpress.
You can find the same shit on AliExpress without the Bezos tax.
Hell yeah, if there’s one thing I already can’t get on Amazon is Chinese knockoffs /s
This has been my play since last February. In some ways it sucks, because Amazon really cornered the market on niche solutions to niche problems. However, when there is something I absolutely need I try to look for a local solution and if I can’t find that, I use eBay. By no means a perfect solution (ie. a lot of the eBay vendors still use Amazon to fulfill their shipments) but my mindset shifted from “oh yeah go on Amazon and press Buy Now immediately” to really working through a solution, and whether or not I need to purchase an item to enact that solution.
Hell, even ebay and etsy will drop ship you stuff from amazon :(
yes, always disappointing when this happens, but you can usually find vendors who avoid the practice (with some trial and error).
Return it and don’t let them send you Amazon’s return label so they have to pay for shipping. Returns absolutely destroy drop shippers.
That’s easy to take a noble stance when you can afford it. A lot of people rely on the cheapest prices just to get by.
Amazon isn’t the cheapest option in many cases. What you’re saying makes sense if people shop around, the problem is that they generally don’t.
Even if I add shipping costs, Amazon is typically more expensive. I order my car parts from rock auto and have NEVER found Amazon to be cheaper even after adding shipping costs. They were cheap maybe a decade ago when they were trying to fold everybody else but they got enough fools by the short and curlies to start jacking prices up until people start looking elsewhere. Same formula as Wal Mart, it’s a proven good practice for big corps to kill local and small businesses.
Dependso n the area, in remote areas amazon can be WAY cheaper so long as you pass the free shipping threshold even if the items themselves are more expensive.
I feel like that’s any retailer now. Most places online offer free shipping if you hit some threshold.